Brooklyn Daily Eagle

On Wednesday, the council approved legislation sponsored by Chaim Deutsch (D-Brighton Beach-Sheepshead Bay) and Ben Kallos (D-Upper East Side) to install GPS devices on school buses and to give parents the option of using the tracking devices via an app. Another bill would give parents the opportunity before the start of the school year to review and bus routes and request changes to those routes.

Councilmembers Mark Treyger Treyger (D-Coney Island-Gravesend-Bensonhurst), Ben Kallos (D-Upper East Side) and Helen Rosenthal (D-Upper West Side) are pushing legislation to make it easier for New Yorkers to register to vote and to cut the red tape prospective candidates face getting on the ballot.

One bill would seek to strengthen the Young Adult Voter Registration Act, a 2004 law requiring voter registration forms to be sent to graduating high school seniors with their diplomas. The bill would require the forms to be distributed to students in class instead of mailing them with diplomas.

"Ensuring that our schools are connecting students with language-appropriate voter registration materials will help us empower our young adults to stand up, take action for what they believe in, and become part of the social fabric of our city, our state and our country," said Treyger, chairman of the Council’s Committee on Education.

A second bill would require landlords to provide new tenants with voter registration forms with the apartment lease.

The third bill would overhaul the process by which candidates get on the ballot. Under the bill, candidates could qualify to get on the ballot by meeting a minimum threshold to receive public funds through the city’s campaign finance system.

It would do away with the current system which requires candidates to secure a certain number of signatures on nominating petitions from registered voters in their districts.

Kallos charged that the current system has given rise to “ballot bumping,” an effort by well-financed candidates and political clubs to hire lawyers to take opponents to court and knock them off the ballot for minor technical infractions.

On Tuesday, the Council approved Intro 1015-A, a bill sponsored by Councilmembers Ben Kallos and Jumaane Williams, with input from Manhattan Borough President Gail Brewer, to hold building owners who receive tax abatements accountable to the city.

Starting in 2020, landlords who aren’t providing affordable apartments after they have received financial windfalls in the form of city financing or tax breaks will be required to register their units with the city.

The council’s Committee on Governmental Operations voted to pass legislation sponsored by Councilmember Ben Kallos (D-Upper East Side) that would require the New York City Campaign Finance Board (CFB) to create a secure website and mobile app for residents who want to register to vote online.

“Democracy should be a click away. We are used to filling out forms online with the click of a mouse and voter registration should be no different. You should be registered and receive a confirmation by email, just as with any other website,” Kallos said in a statement.

“I am excited to become one of the almost 1 million IDNYC cardholders, and I am proud to do it in my district on Roosevelt Island,” said Councilmember Ben Kallos (D-Upper East Side-Midtown East-Roosevelt Island), who personally signed up for an IDNYC card after the press conference.

New York City Councilmember Ben Kallos (Upper East Side, Roosevelt Island) told the crowd, “We’re taking back our waterfront.” He said that the expanded ferry service expected to roll out in 2017-2018 would “connect all five boroughs.”

The Councilmember has literally immersed himself in his subject.

“It’s always a please to swim across the East River, and around the Statue of Liberty with New York Swim,” he said. “Tomorrow morning I’ll be in the Hudson, swimming from 99th to 79th.”

Want to know who is getting a city contract to reconstruct the pavement around Brooklyn Borough Hall, what new rules the Taxi and Limousine Commission is considering or what Request for Proposals the city has issued in Brooklyn?

The City Record has published that sort of information -- procurement, public hearings, disposition of public property and hiring -- every day in print since 1873 and online for the last couple of years. But the data is in a format that can’t be easily searched or analyzed, stumping those who need historical information or a big-picture understanding of the city’s operations.

On Thursday, Mayor Bill de Blasio signed a bill that will bring the city’s municipal data archives into the 21st century.

Residents as young as 16 would be able to take seats on the city’s 59 community boards if a movement in the State Legislature to lower the age of eligibility is successful.

This week, the City Council’s Governmental Operations Committee voted unanimously to approve a resolution introduced by Councilman Ben Kallos (D-Upper East Side) at the suggestion of Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer that calls on the full council to support a bill in the State Legislature that would amend the state’s Public Officers Law and would allow for a change in the City Charter to allow young people to serve.